Tightrope

Tightrope
Reputation	Notoriety Criminal E /
Author	LavenderTea (capes)
Pronouns	They/Them
Civilian name	Swayne 'Sway' Adderton
Alignment	Villain
Affiliation	None (Denver)
Age	24
Status	NPC
Nationality	Scottish
Approver	Nashoid
Trigger Type	Single Standard Trigger

Publicly Available Information

Power Description: Tightrope's legs are affected by a breaker state that allows them to stand on any surface.

Information: Tightrope is a small time nuisance who has not performed any notable actions at time of writing.

Costume Appearance

Muted, Dappled blues that hug the upper body, fabric gradually but gets looser around the waist. very flowy in the kind of way that someone who doesn't have to worry about tripping over themselves would design. mask is a piece of pale cloth that covers the face, they often discard this after the changes begin and the need for it has passed.

Civilian Appearance

Brown eyes, thin but well built. Perpetually dressed in hoodies and comfy looking gym clothes, Hair is a bright red that's dyed rather than natural, single earring in the right ear that's visibly some kind of ornate knife, pale to the point where you wonder if they've ever seen the sun ever at any point in their life.

Mentality

Tightrope struggles with a Schizoid personality disorder, they enjoy bantering in the context of a fight, but has a fundamental disinterest in people and their workings that makes it difficult for them to maintain long term relationships, they're a cape geek, but in the way a baseball fan knows the players rather than the mechanics of the system, they don't tend to do much research and prefer to throw themselves into situations with minimal preparation. likes being told what to do, so they don't have to think about it.

Skills & Training

• Very good hand to hand, tends to prioritize kicks and has a weak hook, probably studied muay thai, terrible grappler, just like actually horrible.
• High school diploma, Bachelor of Arts with a major in Philosophy
• Physically quite fit, doesn't lift but does a lot of cardio.
• Can cry on cue (The only thing that works is thinking of children falling).
• Some basic marksmanship training with a crossbow

Resources & Wealth

Literally lives at the gym, or at least, in a tiny one room apartment above one, makes rent by giving out flyers at the train station, but occasionally supplements their income with the secret ingredient of crime.

• Owns a Phone, Shitty Laptop and a printer, often doesn't have the money to pay for internet.
• Has a job working for the local gym, its not a career.

Equipment & Gear

• Cheap shitty burner phone
• Costume
• Medkit
• Hand crossbow and a single bolt

Parahuman Power

Tightrope's body from the waist down blends into trapezoid points of blue exotic matter. While this effect takes hold over about three seconds and only visible below the waist, other effects gradually radiate out from the waist, where the effect is strongest. Over the course of any engagement, Tightrope’s body will gradually change. Grasping claws grow from the fingers, organs and bones become more lightweight and durable, the brain optimises to reduce the effects of G-forces and plan out routes of escape. Tightrope gets better at running away the longer they’re in a stressful situation.

Tightrope’s ‘legs’ are entirely prehensile, regenerate almost instantly, and can extend up to 10 metres in length. They have the unique property of seamlessly merging with whatever surface they contact and treating it as 'down' for the purposes of any forces applied to their body. Tightrope's power ignores traditional constraints such as weight and momentum when attached to an object, allowing them to walk on the surface of a river, or transition seamlessly from falling to standing on a window regardless of how fast they were going a moment prior.

Tightrope is not manton limited, and can stick to people as easily as they can other objects. However, the subject is not impeded by this process, as for all intents and purposes, tightrope has no mass when attached to an object. Tightrope describes the sensation of attempting to stick to a person as “awkward and squishy” in the same way they would if asked about why they don’t simply attach themselves to the air. Subjects report no distress from having tightrope attached to them.

Background & Trigger

Hours pass, flyers are handed out. It’s the kind of work that wears you down over time, day in day out, the same lines, the same flyers. One thing you never expect to see though, are the same faces cropping up twice. Usually it's pretty mundane, they missed a flyer, left something on the train. But that’s not always how it goes, and you’ve gotten into a few scrapes in the past. Working in a subway tunnel, there’s not exactly a lot you can do if a situation goes bad, you’re pretty keenly aware that there’s only two ways to run if someone decides to jump you.

Today is different though, not the kind of negative attention you’re used to. One guy, just like anyone else in the crowd, watches you handing out the flyers, but for a really uncomfortable amount of time. He just.. Stands there, waiting. Out of nowhere, he snaps a pic and darts away, leaving you stunned for a moment. You try not to think about it on the way home, but then after about a day or so, you start getting messages from someone in your highschool class, though.. Not someone you’ve spoken to before. The man says he knows you, or at least who you used to be, supposedly recognised you at the station and really really wanted to talk. Says he wants to hang out sometime, just the two of you, probably somewhere private. You know where this is going and have the good sense not to end up in a bodybag, so you block his ass and try not to think about it. You call in sick to work the next day, making sure to let your boss know about your weirdo stalker. A few days later, the dude gets an ass kicking for trying to catch you on your own, he never tries it again.

it's not until a few months later when you hear the news, it's a small town, news travels pretty fast. He hanged himself. Turns out he just wasn’t out yet, didn’t really have anyone to help him find himself after his family ditched him. You sit there numbly as a couple of people from highschool start talking about it, and you find out after a while that he was reaching out to them too, just nobody wanted to give him the time of day.

Even at your job handing out flyers, it really starts to sink in. the paper clenched white knuckled as you hand it out, and the roar of the train going past just makes everything feel.. worse. It’s all you can do to keep it together when someone in the back asks something that makes your skin crawl. “Hi! I love your style! Can I get a photo with you?”

Trigger.